Carson OKs Raise, Probable Layoffs for City Workers : Labor: City’s biggest municipal union had to choose between pay increases and preserving jobs, officials said.

The Carson City Council this week gave final approval to a new contract with its largest union that includes a 5.5% cost-of-living increase but is most likely to force layoffs among city workers.

The two-year agreement failed to achieve wage and benefit concessions that city officials had said were needed to help balance this year’s budget. As a result of the contract with Local 809, American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees, the city will be forced to impose additional layoffs, Deputy City Administrator Scot Yotsuya said Wednesday.

There probably will be fewer than 10 layoffs, although the exact number will not be determined for several weeks, Yotsuya said. The city has 295 employees, and five unions represent them.

City officials said the union knew it had to choose between a reduced wage and benefit package and layoffs.

However, Nathan Williams, president of Local 809, said the union gave the city a number of cost-saving and revenue-generating proposals. Among them was a plan to retrain employees to do work that is currently contracted out, as well as a proposal to increase city fees.

The union had been without a contract since last July. The 5.5% increase was effective March 1, and a second cost-of-living increase, which has yet to be determined, will take effect July 1.

The anticipated deficit for the fiscal 1990-91 budget of $29.6 million is at least $400,000, said Finance Director Lorraine Oten.

Yotsuya said that because a consensus could not be reached among the city’s five unions on wage and benefit concessions, the city was unable to obtain the savings needed to balance the budget. The city had been seeking freezes in benefits and wages--rather than scheduled cost-of-living increases--as well as a “rolling furlough,” or unpaid leave.

The city cut 40 positions in late November to save money when the council adopted the budget, but those cuts were not implemented. The status of those employees remained in limbo while the city unsuccessfully sought freezes in wages and benefits from its unions in exchange for a no-layoff promise.

The council gave final approval to the contract in a closed session Tuesday, despite having voted Nov. 20 to adopt a budget that called for wage and benefit freezes for city workers. In addition to the 40 positions eliminated then, the city laid off 15 probationary employees earlier in November.

Voting for the contract Tuesday were council members Kay Calas and Michael Mitoma and Mayor Vera Robles DeWitt. Councilwoman Sylvia Muise abstained, and Councilwoman Juanita McDonald was ill.

Calas said she supported the agreement with Local 809 because the city had locked in cost-of-living increases with its other unions before the November budget decisions. The city was unable to get those unions--which represent mostly management employees--to forgo their scheduled cost-of-living increases.

“I thought it would have been unfair to not give it” to Local 809, Calas said.

McDonald said Wednesday that, given the city’s financial constraints, she could not understand how the council could approve a salary increase for the employees. “We don’t have the money for that,” McDonald said. “We are in a serious crunch.”

Mitoma said Local 809 was offered a choice: Give up the cost-of-living increase and save jobs, or accept the increase and eliminate jobs.

“If the union votes for fewer people, that’s their prerogative,” he said.

The other council members could not be reached for comment.

City officials said the city’s fiscal problems were created in part by a slowdown in the economy, which reduced sales-tax revenue. The council balanced the 1989-90 budget of $29.9 million by taking $2.2 million from the city’s reserve account, which Carson officials prefer to use for emergencies or for replacing capital equipment. There is about $7 million left in the account, but the council would prefer not to raid it again, several members have said.

A significant part of the anticipated deficit stems from the city’s failure to implement the layoffs of the 40 workers whose positions were eliminated Nov. 20. Oten said the omission cost the city between $300,000 and $400,000. While she declined to give a specific deficit figure, she said it will be in a report that will be given to the council next week.

Since February, 35 of the 40 workers who served in the terminated positions have been transferred to other jobs that were vacant, city officials said.